SpaceX is hiking up the prices for the company’s satellite internet service Starlink, citing rising costs from “excessive levels of inflation.”
Starting in May, subscribers will have to pay $110 per month to receive internet from Starlink, up from $99, the company announced in an email to customers on Tuesday.
SpaceX is also raising the one-time fee subscribers must pay for the dish necessary to connect with the Starlink network. If you already placed a pre-order, the Starlink dish will now cost you $549, up from the original $499. Meanwhile, new customers who sign up for Starlink starting on Tuesday will have to fork over $599. The official Starlink.com website has already added the price change.
“The sole purpose of these adjustments is to keep pace with rising inflation,” the company said. Earlier this month, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk noted his company was “seeing significant recent inflation pressure in raw materials and logistics.”
SpaceX is also justifying the price increases by pointing to the company’s growing investments to expand Starlink’s coverage and capabilities.
“Since launching our public beta service in October 2020, the Starlink team has tripled the number of satellites in orbit, quadrupled the number of ground stations and made continuous improvements to our network,” the company said. “Going forward, users can expect Starlink to maintain its cadence of continuous network improvements as well as new feature additions.”
Still, the price increases will certainly annoy consumers. So in response, the company is offering subscribers a partial refund of $200 if they return their Starlink dish hardware within the first year of service. “If you have received your Starlink in the past 30 days, you can return it for a full refund,” the company added.
So far, it seems the company’s email about the price increases was sent to customers based in at least two markets: the U.S. and Australia.
Starlink is currently serving 250,000 subscribers across the globe, according to SpaceNews. However, the company is also facing a massive backlog of demand from interested users. Back in November, SpaceX reported that over 750,000 users across the globe had placed “orders/deposits” for the satellite broadband system.
